The day is drawing closer! 29th September for the great unwashed.. 27th for those that have preordered through Origin or have Medal of Honour LE.. This is an open beta though, anyone can play it, not just those that have preodered etc.

The beta map is a modified version of Operation Metro which is Rush mode.

I have looked at hosting some servers but can't for BF3, there are NO DEDICATED SERVERS ie you can't run your own. EA choose "partner" game service providers who you can then rent servers from. I'm doubting there are any in NZ as even internode were having trouble becoming one last I heard. Seriously stupid as I don't mind paying for servers/bandwidth to subsidize EA's game but for them to force me to use their "partner" organizations so they can make a cut again....

ON3 are New Zealand EA partners. They will be hosting beta and the final servers (as they have done with Bad company 2). I get <30ms ping to ON3 servers, theres no problem there at all. They will even be offering public rental servers as well, example your own clan server.

I only just got my key through MOH on Steam. Kept refreshing, scared it wasn't going to work. Anyway my download on Origin is going full blast, 1.5MB/s on TCL cable so hopefully I'll get a game in before bedtime!